“Get out in that kitchen, rattle those pots and pans …”
– Big Joe Turner
It was the kitchen battle that changed Kevin Relf from a kid who liked to cook into a young man who knew he was going to be a chef: duplicating his grandfather’s braised Blue Crab dish so perfectly that no one could tell the difference.
“That’s the dish that made me want to be a chef,” said Relf, 26, a Long Island, N.Y., native with degrees in cooking and hotel administration from the Culinary Institute of America and Cornell University. “My Mom freaked out when I told her, but I just love food. I love everything about it.”
That love, combined with hard work and nostalgia for his mother’sItalian heritage led Relf to his first big-league gig: executive chef at West Kitchen & Tavern, the restaurant that opened in July 2012 at Loew’s Hotel in downtown Annapolis.